Read it.

Don’t ever say we don’t have useful stuff here.

Freeberg waxes dyspeptic.

Civilization is made up of very few of these messages: “It is wrong to kill or hurt other people”; “If someone has something you want, you need to acquire consent from them before you take it and that usually means paying for it”; “If you help me get things done I want to get done, I will give you this money.” Liberals and democrats want taxes higher, higher, higher, all the time and they don’t have a set amount in mind, nor do they want to pay for “police, fire departments and park benches”; they just want the taxes to be high, so they can attack that 3rd message that keeps civilization working and functional. Ideally, for them, the tax rate would be 100% and we’d all be fed & sheltered by living on the dole. Then, dependency on the state would also be 100%. Then they’d reach the “fun part” — they tell the rest of us what to do, and we go do it.

…

Higher taxes bring civilization to a stop. They’re supposed to do this. They remove the ability, as well as the incentive, for children to grow into strong, complete, capable adults. They’re supposed to do that, too. Minimal taxes are a lubricant. Higher taxes are a solvent.

Remember this next time you hear someone monologue away about the evils of a tax cut…

Viscount Ridley looks at technology.

Amara’s Law implies that between the early disappointment and the later underestimate there must be a moment when we get it about right; I reckon these days it is 15 years down the line. We expect too much of an innovation in the first ten years and too little in the first 20, but get it about right at 15. Think about the internet. In William Gibson’s 1984 novel Neuromancer, he foresaw a world of “cyberspace” in which every computer in the world was linked, with profound effects on society. This looked a bit overrated 15 years years later, when the dotcom bubble burst. The Nobel prize-winning economist Paul Krugman wrote in 1998 that “by 2005 or so, it will become clear that the internet’s impact on the economy has been no greater than the fax machine’s”. He went on: “As the rate of technological change in computing slows, the number of jobs for IT specialists will decelerate, then actually turn down; ten years from now, the phrase information economy will sound silly.”

Amara’s Law has a habit of trapping people into such foolhardy remarks after the initial hype subsides, but just before the second wave.

On the other hand, Krugman is famous for being clueless outside of the narrow economics speciality that earned him his Nobel, but that’s probably just a coincidence.

Michael Eric Dyson: Trump ‘Excretes The Feces Of His Moral Depravity’ Onto America [VIDEO]  Haters gotta hate.

MSNBC Contributor: Eight Out Of Ten Skinheads Support Trump [VIDEO]  And he counted every damned one. Yeah.

David Brock May Be Illegally Funding An Effort To Impeach Trump

Chelsea Handler Leaves Home Because Trump ‘Setting the World on Fire’  Don’t let the door hit you in the butt.

Read it.

But you have to remember that Trump is a HORRIBLE RACIST who wants to put black people in concentration camps.

Trump says he ‘admired’ Martin Luther King at civil rights museum opening amid boycotts over his attendance

What a white supremacist!

Read it.

They say that as if it were a bad thing. But it’s not a bad thing; it’s a good thing.

If, instead of a ‘uranium firm’, it had been some stick-their-noses-in-everyone-else’s-business NGO, they would be applauding like all getout.

Read it.

Because the other two (two?) were so successful….

Read it.

Police in Atlanta are the latest blunt instrument around the country used to crack down on people sharing food with those in need.

Though the Fulton County permit requirement Atlanta police claim to be enforcing has been on the books for many years, it appears Atlanta’s mayor only decided recently to enforce it, just in time for Thanksgiving. Violators face potential fines.

This crackdown is part of a larger, awful, and national trend.

Read it.

Hey, spending taxpayer money is what they’re there for.

Yet Another Corrupt Black Democrat. Not really news, but a useful reminder.

Read it.

Yet Another Hate Hoax.

Read it.

Seems appropriate.

Read it.

Just so long as you remember that Trump has accomplished ABSOLUTELY NOTHING in his first year in office.

John Lewis Refuses To Share Stage with Trump At Civil Rights Museum Opening  I’m sure Trump is relieved.

Eminem Makes Another Sad Attempt At Getting Trump’s Attention

‘CNN Tonight’ Beclowns Itself, Again Questions Trump’s Health; Argues He’s Not Well  I saw him sneeze! Can we impeach him for that?

CNN Wonders Aloud If Trump Wears Dentures — ‘We Have No Idea’

Bernie Sanders: Trump should ‘think about resigning’ over 2016 Access Hollywood tape

Journalists Damn Demented Donald as Worse Than Bin Laden and Comparable to Charles Manson  Both of whom got more sympathetic press than Trump.

Matthews Implies Trump’s Jerusalem Announcement Could Cause Another Benghazi  Only if Hillary is SecState.

Trump’s mental state a ‘danger to us all’, warns leading forensic psychiatrist  Scott Adams calls this the Psychic Psychiatrist Illusion.

Read it.

There are blue pustules even in red states, and Austin is one of the worst.

Read it.

Let that be a lesson to us all.

Read it.

How about that government-provided health care? Don’t you wish America had a system like that?

You could always vote for Bernie….

Read it.

“The horrible thing about the Two Minutes Hate was not that one was obliged to act a part, but, on the contrary, that it was impossible to avoid joining in.” — George Orwell in the novel, 1984

Georgie said a mouthful there! We see it with the attack on Taylor Swift now for failing to chime in on hate for Trump. I will return to this in a bit.

When I left my little left-wing sect in 1979, I lost most of one set of friends. In fact, unbeknownst to me, the group voted specifically to disinvite me to their convention held every other summer at Oberlin. I had had no intention whatsoever of going, but they felt it was necessary to make sure their members got the message that any deviation on their parts would result in similar shunning. A powerful social control tool, that. Used by all cults, political or religious.

…

I don’t know about you, but I really don’t want any politician to fight for me; I just want him to get out of my way and leave me the hell alone.

Hear hear.

City banker turns his back on a fat salary to join the fight against Isis

Mohammed Abdallah: Jihadi linked to Manchester Arena bomber convicted of joining Isis in Syria

Five reasons why Trump recognising Jerusalem as the capital of Israel won’t destroy peace in the Middle East

Intifada: What is it and and what would a third Palestinian uprising mean for Israel and the Middle East?

FBI: ISIS ‘Going Dark’ On Social Media, Communications Increasingly Encrypted

Beauty Queen Faces A Year In Jail For Comparing Her Period To ‘Martyrs’ Blood’

Britons who join Isis should never be allowed to return to UK, says Defence Secretary Gavin Williamson

Jerusalem latest: Hamas calls for new Palestinian uprising against Israel after Donald Trump announcement  As opposed to the old Palestinian uprising, I suppose.

Jerusalem latest: Protests erupt in Gaza as Palestinians respond to Trump’s decision with fury  My, what a surprise.

Daily Mail: Terror suspect ‘encouraged ISIS fanatics to attack Prince George in his primary school while using secure app and warned “Even the royal family won’t be left alone”

Foiled Theresa May Assassination Plot May Reveal Clues As To ISIS’s Next Move  Preventing Brexit?

Jerusalem – live updates: Donald Trump expected to recognise city as Israel’s capital in hours as Palestinians burn images of US President

UK terror attacks: Review reveals what MI5 knew about Manchester, London Bridge and Westminster attackers

Two men charged with terror offences after alleged attack plot thwarted

Woman Stabbed in the Neck for Refusing Migrant’s Advances

IPT Investigation Reveals ICNA Partner’s Close Ties to Kashmiri Jihadists

Nine terror plots foiled in the UK in the past year, MI5 chiefs reveal

Children exposed to terror radicalisation by Government’s failure to tackle root causes of extremism, report finds

France: Court orders halal supermarket in Paris to close because it does not sell pork or wine

Mattis Presses Pakistan To Stop Backing Terror Groups

Yemen civil war: Ex-president Ali Abdullah Saleh killed while fleeing to Saudi Arabia, claim Houthis

Islamists, Apologists, and Fellow Travelers: Middle East Studies Faculty at Georgetown University

ISIS Still Holds ‘Thousands’ Of Female Sex Slaves Despite Major Losses

Germany Warns Of ‘Highly Radicalized’ ISIS Wives, Children  Oh, say it ain’t so.

Israel strikes Iranian base in Syria

The rest of the world has woken up, but migrants are still sleepwalking into Libya slave markets  Islam has no problem with slavery; never did.

One dead after hit-and-run driver strikes six people during knife fight outside Queens hookah bar

Yemen rebel alliance falls apart amid fighting in capital – as ex-president Saleh offers talks to Saudi coalition

Cultural Enrichment Comes to the Isle of Lewis

Will Pakistan’s Support for Terrorists Destroy Its Relationship with America?

Report: ‘Counter-Protester’ Started Infamous Charlottesville Parking Garage Fight

Cal State Professor: Bin Laden’s Islamist Inspiration is ‘Misunderstood’

Pakistan shooting: ‘At least 13 dead’ after Taliban disguised in burqas storm Peshawar university

Europe’s Muslim population projected to increase by 50m by 2050 in ‘high migration’ scenario

Black Banners of ISIS: The Roots of the New Caliphate

American ISIS Fighter In Legal ‘Black Hole’ As US Tries To Figure Out What To Do With Him

Connecting with the Enemy: A Century of Palestinian-Israeli Joint Nonviolence  And if you believe that one, they’ll tell you another one.

Engineers of Jihad: The Curious Connection between Violent Extremism and Education

Genesis of the Palestinian Authority

Did President Trump slur his speech?  Did he stub his toe? Can we impeach him for that?

Chelsea Handler Forced To Flee Burning Mansion — Blames President Trump For Wildfires  And Global Warming! Don’t forget Global Warming! That’s Trump’s fault too!

Joy Behar: #MeToo Campaign Was A ‘Reaction To Trump’  As is, of course, everything bad that happens anywhere.

Angry Esquire Writer Furious That Trump Has Been ‘Normalized’  I mean, how dare they?

Watch This MSNBC Meltdown for the Ages Over Trump’s ‘Delusional,’ ‘Orwellian’ Jerusalem Speech  Pass the popcorn.

South Park: ‘Very Desperate and Very Dangerous’ President ‘Scaring’ Children

Obama invokes Hitler’s rise in stark warning to America  Doesn’t he know that the ‘Trump is Hitler’ meme is so fifteen minutes ago?

Jennifer Lawrence pledges to throw Martini in Donald Trump’s face  Proglodytes never really grow up, do they?

Andrea Mitchell Parrots Talking Point That Trump’s Israel Move Was For Alabama Christians  Yeah, right.

Top House Dem Praises Trump’s Jerusalem Move Hours After He Voted To Impeach Him

Morning Joe Again Questions Trump’s Fitness For Office  Yawn.

NBC: Trump’s ‘Betrayal’ of Palestinians ‘Killed’ Peace Process  What ‘peace process’? The one where ‘Palestinians’ felt free to attack and murder Israelis whenever they wanted to?

If you’ve been following the coverage, you will note that Franken hasn’t actually resigned. He’s merely said that he will resign sometime in the near future.

Don’t count chickens before they’re hatched.

UPDATE: Franken Accuser Calls Out His Non-Apology [VIDEO]

UPDATE: The Franken Hedge?

UPDATE: Gil Reich: Al Franken’s Non-Resignation

Some of us remember.

Read it.

Read it.

But of course Trump is the narcissist.

Read it.

Pretty bad when you can’t even depend on your own propaganda arm.

Megyn Kelly Featured in Time Cover Story: Trump’s Election ‘A Setback for Women’

Kirsten Nielson Sworn In As DHS Secretary

Read it.

Bloomberg News corrected Wednesday its bombshell report that special counsel Robert Mueller had subpoenaed Deutsche Bank records pertaining to President Donald Trump and his family.

The corrected report said the bank records “pertain to people affiliated” with Trump. Bloomberg had originally reported that Mueller “zeroed in” on Trump.

Never mind!

Read it.

For a ‘man with no principles’, Trump is acting pretty thoroughly Republican.

I haven’t seen an American President do this many Republican things in one year since Reagan.

Read it.

Unmentioned: All the trouble will be caused by Muslim extremists.

The foundation of all of these complaining articles is ‘Everybody knows that Muslims will go crazy, so we ought not to do it.’ And yet if you actually say that, the finger-pointing and screams of ‘Islamophobia!’ spread like wildfire.

Read it.

Case rested.

Read it.

With unanimous consent, the swift passage of the Taylor Force Act brings the United States one step closer to stripping American funding from the Palestinian Authority until it ends its “pay to slay” policy, which distributes $300 million to terrorists and their families annually. The legislation now heads to the Senate for a floor vote.

Read it.

So all those promises that past Presidents broke, Trump is keeping.

What a reprehensible thing to do. Who made this guy President, anyway?

‘Your country is desolate, your cities are burned with fire: your land, strangers devour it in your presence, and it is desolate, as overthrown by strangers.’ –Isaiah 1:7.

Read it.

Surprising only to the coastal Crust. For a ‘man with no principles’, Trump is doing a remarkable job of rolling back the administrative state.

Read it.

The death toll from Boko Haram violence is way down in 2017, with fewer than 400 civilians killed. About half of those were from a few major suicide bomb attacks in August and November. Meanwhile the aggressive efforts by Moslem Fulani raiders against largely Christian farmers in Central Nigeria (mainly Plateau, Jos, Kaduna, Benue and Nassarawa states) keeps getting worse and this year spread to Adamawa state where Boko Haram was also active (but not as much as next door in Borno State). In 2016 the Fulani violence left 2,500 dead and that intensity continued into 2017. The Fulani herders have become more deadly than Boko Haram but that has not become a major issue because the Fulani problem has been around for centuries and is not as organized and media savvy as Islamic terror groups like Boko Haram.

Read it.

I visited the Patagonia web site looking for some Christmas presents yesterday and learned that “the president stole my land.” How horrible! So I looked into it and discovered that President Trump took federal land that was managed by a particular set of federal agencies under a particular set of restrictions and changed it into federal land managed by the very same federal agencies under a slightly different set of restrictions. Not to jump on Patagonia, whose clothing I’ve always enjoyed, but where’s the theft in that?

I don’t know that there is a special name for the phobia that is ‘fear that something somewhere is not being regulated by the government’, but there ought to be.

Read it.

Thomas was praying and speaking with women in front of a Planned Parenthood facility when a woman started threatening to beat and “f—” her up, according to Students for Life of America. The woman reportedly then stole a sign reading, “All people are made in the image of God,” at which point the students started to record the incident.

The woman returned, tried to steal another sign, and subsequently punched Thomas in the face.

Haters gotta hate.

Read it.

Ya just gotta believe.

Morning Joe Spreads Fake News About Trump Promoting a Terrorist Group That Assassinates U.K. Politicians

Trump’s ‘dangerous’ tax reforms could kill 10,000 people a year, says former Treasury secretary Larry Summers  Could, but won’t. They always leave that part out.

Trump greeted by protesters chanting ‘F*** you!’ after he slashes Utah national monuments  Haters gotta hate.

The Newest Round of Anti-Trumpism  Lord Black takes a look at the state of play.

Democratic Lawmaker Vows Trump Impeachment Vote Will Happen  Proglodytes see it when they believe it.

Sanders Asked If Trump Visiting Civil Rights Museum Is ‘Insulting.’  Uh, yeah, sure, whatever you say.

Steven Spielberg: Here’s My Anti-Trump Movie  Because beating Trump is actually more important.

Read it.

Apparently the acorn doesn’t fall very far from the tree.

Read it.

Bears Ears was established under the Antiquities Act in Dec. 2016 by former President Barack Obama.

“When we look at the underlying act, it does give the president broad discretion [to designate monuments],” Ute Indian Tribe attorney Jeffrey Rasmussen said on a press call Tuesday. “The legal issue that we are going to be getting to is can the president or can a new president go back and redo that use of discretion.”

Read it.

Florida police arrested a Filipino green card holder for planning a mass shooting at an Islamic center to give Muslims “a taste of their own medicine.”

Read it.

A judge in Indiana has stopped a city’s nasty plot to make people sell their homes to a redeveloper or else face thousands of dollars of rapidly accumulating fines.

In Charlestown, Indiana, a community north of Louisville with a population of less than 8,000, the mayor and other city leaders have been trying to transfer ownership of private plots of land in the low-income neighborhood of Pleasant Ridge to a developer. This developer would then raze all the properties and build an entirely new neighborhood.

Charlestown did not take advantage of Kelo v. City of New London, the Supreme Court decision that allows the government to transfer property to a private developer via eminent domain. That would have required the city to pay the property’s current owners.

Instead, the city targeted Pleasant Ridge with ruthless code enforcement. Property owners were cited and fined hundreds of dollars for every individual violation. Unlike the usual practice in code enforcement, the owners were not given any grace period to correct the problems before the fines were levied: They were levied immediately and compounded dailyuntil the problems were fixed. And even when the violations were fixed, the owners had to pay the fines. The only relief offered to them came if they agreed to sell their properties to the developer.

Read it.

It’s not about a crooked Republican, so it’s not a thing.

Read it.

Further adventures of Ballou High School.

A school district removed a principal Monday after the majority of its graduating students missed over six weeks of school and still graduated.

Antwan Wilson, chancellor of D.C.’s public schools, removed Yetunde Reeves as principal of Ballou Senior High School, reported The Washington Post. Wilson made the decision less than a week following an endorsement of Reeves.